Administrative Law

Ramesh Birch v. Union of India

AIR 1990 SC 560; 1989 Supp (1) SCC 430

Facts

Whether the power to extend existing laws to a Union Territory with modifications amounts to excessive delegation.

Legislature cannot delegate its essential legislative function.
But it can delegate power to extend existing laws to new territories.
Modification is valid if it is for adaptation and does not destroy the basic policy of the law.
The delegate cannot create a completely new law under the mask of modification.

The Court treated this as a practical necessity in administering Union Territories.
Union Territories may not always have full legislative machinery.
Therefore, Parliament may authorise the executive to apply suitable laws from other jurisdictions.
The essential policy remains that existing laws are being adapted, not invented from scratch.
The executive is not deciding legislative policy independently.
It is only selecting and applying laws already made by a competent legislature.
This was different from a case where the delegate is given unguided power to make an entirely new legal regime.

The Supreme Court upheld the delegation.
It held that extension of laws with necessary adaptation is valid.
Use this case for: delegation for territorial extension/adaptation is valid if essential legislative policy is not surrendered.